By Joe Joe Wright

The State of Georgia needs a winner. It has been a long time since we won anything. In baseball the Braves are lucky Philadelphia is in their division; they are the only thing keeping Atlanta from the cellar. In football the Falcons had a good season but then blew a super bowl win, just absolutely blew it. The Hawks make the playoffs but just like all the other teams in the NBA all are lacking except Cavaliers and Warriors. The Bulldogs football, baseball and basketball have not done any damage either. Add Ga. Tech to that list as well. Literally none of the primary sports teams in Georgia have put us over the top. The Falcons losing like they did seriously damaged their remarkable season. We have certainly been in a rut lately. Oh! But we have spent a great deal of money invested in new structures. Mercedes Benz Stadium at 1.6 billion dollars ,wow! SunTrust Park and all the extra hoopla that goes with it 1.1 billion dollars. Atlanta and the Hawks are spending 192 million to expand and renovate Phillips  Arena. Turner Field, which is only 21 years old, was sold to Georgia State for just 30 million dollars and they plan on a 58 million renovation to make it more football friendly.

The University of Georgia did finally build an indoor practice facility. Total cost will exceed 30 million to practice football inside. Ga. Tech is getting some pretty significant stipends from the ACC after this past year but they don’t have any big dollar projects as of now. Georgia Southern University hasn’t got any big money to spend neither does Valdosta State, who still shares there home stadium with Valdosta High School.

So were does that put the people of Georgia after spending over 3 billion dollars. IN THE HOLE!!!!! So often sports franchises make a big whoopee do over getting new facilities at taxpayer expense. Well from my point of view they can pack up and go to any number of 20 qualified cities across the USA. The actual return in money just ain’t worth it. The only one making money is the owners and of course the University of Georgia. The big colleges are getting filthy rich on the backs of kids and that argument of a free education ain’t flying no more with me.

I use to be a big proponent but now I say the kids need a stipend. Ever sense the NFL first let the Oakland Raiders  bolt to Los Angeles this whole new stadium business has gotten way out of hand. I mean pro sport teams have moved long years before the Raiders first did it. The Braves went from Boston to Milwaukee to Atlanta. The A’s from Philadelphia to Oakland, the Lakers from Minnesota to Los Angeles and so on and so on. Of course the wishy-washy Raiders have gone from Oakland to L.A. back to Oakland and now onto Las Vegas. Lot’s of teams have moved for better stadiums and stadium deals. The problem again is the taxpayer ends up funding this, and most of the time that is the property owners. Just once I would like to see people owning private businesses pay their own way and stop looking for handouts from taxpayers to get their business venture of the ground, after all they are not sharing the revenue they make when they start making money. Pharmaceutical company’s are the worst but that is a whole other story. Oh one that still gets my goat is the bail out in 2008. Started by Bush II as a “ to big to fail” and signed and delivered by Obama. About 800 billion dollars worth of nothing, the economy crashed anyway. I got an idea, everyone pay your own way!!! And if there are any citizens that need a little help well we are a CHRISTIAN nation we will help them but businesses are on their own. As always I welcome your comments.